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A comment on Why not just a simple spreadsheet of salaries?. Parent comment

Re:Why not just a simple spreadsheet of salaries? by eldavido on Monday March 21, 2016 @06:26PM (#11332688)
Social status. Developers don't have high social status in Chicago, whereas in the Bay Area, they do.

I don't care what people say, pay is all just social status. Even relatively objective measures like, "I made the company XX" are only possible in the scope of narrow consulting engagements, and such estimates are hazy.

Trying to quantify the long-term economic value of an employee is even worse.

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Re:Why not just a simple spreadsheet of salaries? by spyrosg on Tuesday March 22, 2016 @04:21AM (#11335068)
This. The value of social status could be easily tested by exchanging a high salary for significant ownership of the company. My bet is that people would be just as happy.

Someone here recently ranted a bit against the fact that bright minds work in finance on useless work instead of greater things. The one answer from such a worker was about the huge difference between management compensation and worker compensation in those other, "more important" fields. Not the absolute salary.

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